Offensive line improvement

You would think going into the 2nd season with yet another offseason of the strength and conditioning program, another offseason of learning the scheme and system, another year of bringing in young talent to compete with the guys already here that there would be fine tuning and the OL would naturally improve.

But of course those things don't always happen and sometimes OL units or individuals take a step backwards. Here's to hoping for the best.
 
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I don't know how much it'll improve but it can't possibly be any worse than it was in 2016. The only good thing about last year's OL is now it has nowhere to go but up.
 
OL the biggest open ended question on the team. I think Donaldson will play from day 1, and in all likelihood start out at guard. I think Darling is going to permanently move inside to guard as well. Gauthier has shown he can play on the interior. I think injuries have broken down Linder, but before last year he'd been able to contribute. Gaynor looks like he could factor in early too. So I'd expect some combo of the guys above to be your interior OL. If I was guessing I think the first depth chart will be LG Darling - C Gauthier - RG Donaldson.

Tackle is where things get interesting. None of the guys who have seen the field for us are athletic enough to play LT well so the big question is if 1 of the guys who haven't seen the field yet can step up. Brown, Herbert, maybe even that guy Tre Johnson from last year. That's essential. At RT I think it's probably a competition between the guys who have been up and down (McDermott, Sunny and St. Louis). Hopefully 1 of them can step up and find some consistency. If we have to play 2 of those 3 at the tackle spots it's not ideal. Searles is going to have his spring cut out for him.
 
OL the biggest open ended question on the team. I think Donaldson will play from day 1, and in all likelihood start out at guard. I think Darling is going to permanently move inside to guard as well. Gauthier has shown he can play on the interior. I think injuries have broken down Linder, but before last year he'd been able to contribute. Gaynor looks like he could factor in early too. So I'd expect some combo of the guys above to be your interior OL. If I was guessing I think the first depth chart will be LG Darling - C Gauthier - RG Donaldson.

Tackle is where things get interesting. None of the guys who have seen the field for us are athletic enough to play LT well so the big question is if 1 of the guys who haven't seen the field yet can step up. Brown, Herbert, maybe even that guy Tre Johnson from last year. That's essential. At RT I think it's probably a competition between the guys who have been up and down (McDermott, Sunny and St. Louis). Hopefully 1 of them can step up and find some consistency. If we have to play 2 of those 3 at the tackle spots it's not ideal. Searles is going to have his spring cut out for him.

St. Louis is
 
OL the biggest open ended question on the team. I think Donaldson will play from day 1, and in all likelihood start out at guard. I think Darling is going to permanently move inside to guard as well. Gauthier has shown he can play on the interior. I think injuries have broken down Linder, but before last year he'd been able to contribute. Gaynor looks like he could factor in early too. So I'd expect some combo of the guys above to be your interior OL. If I was guessing I think the first depth chart will be LG Darling - C Gauthier - RG Donaldson.

Tackle is where things get interesting. None of the guys who have seen the field for us are athletic enough to play LT well so the big question is if 1 of the guys who haven't seen the field yet can step up. Brown, Herbert, maybe even that guy Tre Johnson from last year. That's essential. At RT I think it's probably a competition between the guys who have been up and down (McDermott, Sunny and St. Louis). Hopefully 1 of them can step up and find some consistency. If we have to play 2 of those 3 at the tackle spots it's not ideal. Searles is going to have his spring cut out for him.

Thats 1 guy nobody talks about, Tre Johnson
 
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LT: St. Louis / Herbert
LG: Darling / McDermott
C: Gauthier / Linder or Gaynor
RG: Donaldson / Johnson
RT: Brown / Odogwu

I am hopeful McDermott can progress this offseason, but he just doesn't seem strong or quick enough to consistently hold down any starting position right now. If Linder is healthy I wouldn't mind moving him back to LG where he looked solid as a freshman.
 
Running QB's tend to get sacked far more often. They tend to try and make more plays and get sacked when they extend plays beyond the normal 2.5 seconds.

Where Kaaya was awful, and why I believe we may actually get better QB play next year is he did not have pocket presence. I think he was fairly tough, but I don't think he had the ability to feel pressure and to slide and move in the pocket to be just a tad different spot than the rusher expects. If you're a statue, you at least need the ability to slide in the pocket.

Additionally, Kaaya was very much programmed and stayed within the structure of the play. If he didn't see it pre-snap he'd never see pressure coming. He was very bad at identifying pressure and the place to exploit it. Outside rushers especially gave him trouble and he rarely identified where the defense had the advantage.

It's no secret I thought Kaaya was a very good QB with a clean pocket and if the play call was sound. When the defensive play call was designed to stop our play, or the defense sent pressure from unexpected areas, he was very bad.

For me, the reasons above are why we pretty much always beat the teams we should have and almost always lost when we were an underdog or of equal talent to our opponent.

I spent quite a bit of time doing a film breakdown of Kaaya and giving screen shots of the things above to illustrate but my motherboard went out and my computer is with the manufacturer. Might not recreate it, but I went in with a hypothesis and the film confirmed how much extreme variance he exhibited.

Much of winning games is having the ability to overcome unexpected obstacles and that was Kaaya's biggest weakness. Simply having someone who can identify one or two reads on one half of the field and then make a play of it isn't available will actually make us a better team against good opponents. Where I worry is we will miss his consistency against average teams and we might drop a game we shouldn't because of it.

I'm confident the OL will improve markedly. McDermott's biggest issue is a lack of strength. Last offseason was spent removing the Golden bloat. This year will be spent building functional strength. Brown needs strength. Sonny will add depth.

Just improved strength, another year here, and then the massive upgrade in depth on the 2's and 3's will make the OL better without any other changes.


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I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I don't think it is an either/or proposition. The offensive line was dreadful. It's probably just recency bias but I can't think of a year where the OL was worse in the last twenty. And Kaaya could have done a better job of anticipating that pressure and moving laterally or climbing the pocket to buy himself time to throw instead of dropping his eyes and looking to scramble. Does getting knocked around play into Kaaya being extremely gunshy? Definitely. But it is also his job to take better steps to minimize those hits.
 
LT: St. Louis / Herbert
LG: Darling / McDermott
C: Gauthier / Linder or Gaynor
RG: Donaldson / Johnson
RT: Brown / Odogwu

I am hopeful McDermott can progress this offseason, but he just doesn't seem strong or quick enough to consistently hold down any starting position right now. If Linder is healthy I wouldn't mind moving him back to LG where he looked solid as a freshman.

I agree with your line up. Anyone that thinks McDermott should start is on crack. Dude is not consistent but can be a rotation player. Same for Linder, dude is not right for the job. If that is our 2 deep I think we make our new QB happy. Only one that scares me is St. Louis.
 
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McDermott is an uncoordinated oaf. Linder is soft. Neither of dem bums should start.
 
I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I think this is backwards
 
LT: St. Louis / Herbert
LG: Darling / McDermott
C: Gauthier / Linder or Gaynor
RG: Donaldson / Johnson
RT: Brown / Odogwu

I am hopeful McDermott can progress this offseason, but he just doesn't seem strong or quick enough to consistently hold down any starting position right now. If Linder is healthy I wouldn't mind moving him back to LG where he looked solid as a freshman.
[MENTION=3831]ben[/MENTION]

Johnson isn't a guard at 6'8

He'll naturally lose leverage battles due to height
 
I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I think this is backwards

No it's not. When you run RPO, it literally forces you to win your one v. one battles or you'll fail because every team will end up playing man-free against you...and there is a lot of players on our O-line who weren't better than the guy on the other side of the ball
 
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I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I think this is backwards

No it's not. When you run RPO, it literally forces you to win your one v. one battles or you'll fail because every team will end up playing man-free against you...and there is a lot of players on our O-line who weren't better than the guy on the other side of the ball

Yea the line was bad, but when I watched Kaaya play it seemed like he thought he could get away with holding the ball longer than he should. Guys like big ben can hold the ball longer bc he is much bigger and doesnt go down as easily as Kaaya does, somebody like Aaron Rodgers can hold the ball longer and he does because unlike Kaaya he can make things happen with his legs plus he has a much better arm than Kaaya. With a guy who knows when to get rid of the ball better than Kaaya would have made the pass pro look at least marginally better.
 
With the Improvements the O-Line made this past season and the work put in with this staff strength, condition, and discipline (matt drills) plus the infusion of talent from transfers and signings I think the O-Line will become stable and be a strong point on the team
 
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I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I'm not saying the o line was good last year, it was not, but I think if you put a more mobile quarterback, one that could simply move around the pocket better and have better footwork, back there it alone would make the o line look better.

This. A more mobile guy doesn't get sacked 8 times against VT and make that putrid ND defense look like Alabama.

VT had a running QB and gave up more sacks than Miami this year.

When we played tech this year they sacked Kaaya 8 times and we sacked their qb 3 times. Giving up sacks is not the only thing that makes an OL bad or good, and a running qb doesn't nesessarily mean he will take less sacks but I think a quarterback who has better footwork and presence inside the pocket, doesn't hold the ball for too long, and knows when to throw the ball away will make his line look better and maybe have less negative yardage plays.

Playcalling also didn't help the line. Last year was a trifecta of ****. OL, QB, OC.
 
I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I think this is backwards

No it's not. When you run RPO, it literally forces you to win your one v. one battles or you'll fail because every team will end up playing man-free against you...and there is a lot of players on our O-line who weren't better than the guy on the other side of the ball

OCing
 
I like Kaaya but I think having a different (more athletic) qb in there will make the line look better next year as well. I don't think Donaldson or Herbert will start next year, at least not right away.
I think this is backwards. Kaaya did not make the OL look bad. Kaaya literally got his teeth knocked out because of the OL. Now if the OL improves, it will take some pressure off our first year starter QB next year.

I think this is backwards

No it's not. When you run RPO, it literally forces you to win your one v. one battles or you'll fail because every team will end up playing man-free against you...and there is a lot of players on our O-line who weren't better than the guy on the other side of the ball

OCing

I stand by my post
 
If our oline doesn't dramatically improve under Richt he'll never won an ACC title let alone a national title.
 
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